British email prankster fools White House officials

A self-described "email prankster" operating from Britain successfully led several White House officials to believe he worked for the U.S. government, CNN reported Tuesday.

The prankster, pretending he was Jared Kushner, a senior adviser to President Donald Trump, wrote to White House Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert, inviting him for an evening out.

"Tom, we are arranging a bit of a soirée towards the end of August. It would be great if you could make it, I promise food of at least comparable (sic) quality to that which we ate in Iraq. Should be a great evening," he wrote.

Bossert wrote back: "Thanks, Jared. With a promise like that, I can't refuse,” adding his personal email address to his response.

In separate email conversations, the man emailed the official account of Anthony Scaramucci, Trump's former communications director, pretending to be Reince Priebus, the former White House chief of staff, and Ambassador-designate to Russia, Jon Huntsman Jr.

The prankster, writing as Priebus, accused Scaramucci of being “breathtakingly hypocritical,” adding that “at no stage have you acted in a way that is remotely classy.”

Scaramucci responded: “You know what you did. We all do. Even today. But rest assured we were prepared. A Man would apologize.”

In May, banker Jes Staley, who heads Barclays, was also the target of a prank email exchange. The prankster who approached Staley later told the Financial Times that he was in a battle with the bank over a customer issue.